Conservation
by Evilgoddss
Summary: Klaus has been destroyed, but the first law of thermodynamics still applies. VD
1. Chapter 1

**Conservation**

_By Anya (aka Evilgoddss)_

Part One:

_**Conservation of energy** (**the first law of **_**_thermodynamics_**_) is one of several __conservation laws__. It states that the total inflow of __energy__ into a __system__ must equal the total outflow of energy from the system, plus the change in the energy contained within the system. In other words, __energy__ can be converted from one form to another, but it cannot be created or destroyed._

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"Bonnie. It's nine-thirty, get up." Her mother's soft and gentle voice had all the impact of a chainsaw on Bonnie's raw nerves. The seemingly constant rapping of a knuckle on her bedroom door had the same sound as if someone were taking a hammer to her head.

"Sick." She croaked, pulling the covers high above her head and burrowing down miserably into the pillow. Her body felt cold, shivering convulsively beneath the warm blankets. The sweatpants, thick wooly socks and her sweatshirt did nothing to keep her warm.

Blinds shuttered tightly to stave off any light, she knew the moment her door was opened. A sliver of daylight from the hall treaded disdainfully into the room, lightening the shades of her reality from beneath the blankets.

Squinting her eyes tightly shut, and turning towards the window wall and not her door, Bonnie still flinched when her mother pulled down the covers and gasped. "Oh, Bonnie!" She breathed, a gentle hand reaching out to touch her daughter's brow. "You look dreadful!"

The thought, unbidden and unwanted when she was feeling so miserable, still hit her all the same. 'Nice, Mom. Great touch. Thanks for letting me know I look as horrible as I feel. That's the way to cheer me up.' Curling into a tighter ball, she made a small mewl of protest.

"I'll call Meredith, for you." Mrs. McCullough soothed, straightening the blankets and tucking them tightly around her daughter. "I'll let her know you won't make it." There was a small pause, and Bonnie half expected to hear recriminations for her late night, last night.

Last night, wherein Klaus had been stopped and Elena restored to life. Last night when she'd stood her ground alone against an Original and summoned the Host of the Dead. Last night, when Stefan had found joy and reunion with Elena, and Damon had fled.

Last night when she'd come home and crawled into her bed at four in the morning.

"I'll come home at lunch and check on you, Bonnie. Get some sleep. If you aren't better tomorrow, I'll make you and appointment with Dr. Ferris." Her mother interrupted Bonnie's reminiscences. "Your father and I are supposed to be going out tonight, the Solstice dinner at the Scottish Club, but if you want us home we'll cancel."

The grunt, a tiny little sound that hurt her throat far less than any words actually would have seemed to suffice as answer. "If you're sure, then. If you change your mind, don't be too proud to say so, dear." The warm kiss on her forehead, gently given, was a shock to her aching head and chilled body, but her mother must have decided all was well enough for now as her bedroom door closed and the room returned to that dark tomb-like state.

The darkness was soothing, her eyes stopped hurting, and the pounding in her head drifted down to a slow throb rather than the wild beat. She was still shivering, though. 'I'd rather die.' She thought hazily, wrapping arms about her knees and pressing her feet together tightly. 'So cold.'

This chill had settled in an hour after Klaus had been vanquished, gradually seeping under her skin until it consumed her entire being. Stefan had said it was reaction to using so much Power, and that she just needed a good night's sleep to recover.

Ha. It was getting worse. Sleep was impossible, and she could feel her heartbeat and breathing react to the chill now. As bizarre as it sounded, she felt certain she'd die of hypothermia in her own bed.

Hypothermia... like when Elena's car had crashed into the river and she'd died. All that water strangling the body, pulling her under, soaking her through and depriving oxygen to the lungs. Choking the body of life. Darkness... darkness and cold slicing through her body until there was no trembling, no scream to be had and just a numb black nothing.

The sudden lurch and trapped feeling of a seatbelt and locked door. Panic, fear and hysteria mingling amongst the water. Lungs burning under pressure and the next gasp containing no air that can be breathed. The body cold and limbs very heavy -- flaccid, totally unresponsive to sluggish mental commands weighted the survival instinct down. Drowned the spark of life and ushered the soul beyond into nothingness, into the absence of awareness and the antithesis of life.

Death.

Her mind was caught in the imagery, her body so cold already felt as if it was reliving Elena's horrible death. The water swirled around her as it rose higher, above her waist, to her breasts, higher and higher up to her chin. Trapped in her coffin, she couldn't lift her chin up to find oxygenated air. Water enclosed her mouth, overwhelmed her nose and filled her eyes. A hot rash of burning in her lungs set her into a panic. 'I can't breathe!' Her mind thought hysterically. 'I can't breathe!'

The fire built, setting her body trembling and her eyes dimmed, unable to see while her lungs struggled to find air amongst the heavy weight of water. The cold was returning, a dead weighted feel to her legs and arms, her consciousness was receding and she could feel her heart sluggishly beat. Life was fading, emptying and abandoning her body.

Dying.

Safe in her bed, her mind and body overwhelmed and weakened, Bonnie's heart reacted to the dream and slowed. Her breathing choked and stumbled before halting. The hands curled tightly against her body searching for heat went rigid and a horrid rattle echoed from her lungs, yet her mind moved.

Light exploded from nowhere, temporarily filling the void. "It is not a blessing, nor a curse." It was also neither a scream nor a whisper.

The strange echo of sound scurried from the shadows, bashing in at the nothingness that was Bonnie McCullough. Jarred into awareness, her consciousness took shape and Bonnie looked out onto the astral plane, blinking away her disorientation and confusion. 'What's going on?' It was a dream, a strange weird dream that was much more benevolent than the tea-party dream with Elena had been. At least there was no rotting corpses or muddy pies to scare her.

The astral plane was intangible. Even her body felt surreal and artificial, as compared to the last time she'd visited here. Perhaps it was a side effect of her illness, or the depleted state of her powers like Stefan had suggested. Feeling rather like a ghost about to be pulled apart by cross-winds, Bonnie glanced around herself, noticing for the first time a bizarre panorama of images set far away in a distant perimeter. Everywhere she turned, the barrier was visible, glinting silvery in a distance that was fading. Rather like a zoom lens, it lurched forward until she could easily see the details inside fragmented mirrors --- images that reflected all the moments of her life. Her first day at Kindergarten, her grandfather's funeral, sitting on Santa's lap, her first kiss, so many special memories mixed in with everyday ones.

Turning about slowly, she watched the kaleidoscope reflect the progression of her life, from her childhood to near adulthood. From birth to the very last image that made absolutely no sense: herself facing Klaus. 'Why no more? Where's this morning?'

"It is not a blessing, nor a curse." Spinning about again, she tried to isolate the source of the voice. It was eerie. Three or four different voices merging together into a deep three-dimensional echo. Scurrying up and down her spine with a chill, as they spoke again, Bonnie felt the words reverberate into her head, speaking directly into her mind and soul

"What isn't?" She forced the question from a mouth that she knew she had, but wasn't real here on the astral plane. "What isn't a blessing?"

Presences and feelings from deep within cascaded, the noise a dizzying cacophony that overwhelmed her senses, confusing her mind and awareness as it rushed at her and filled her completely.

_---"Vanquished and conquered, the power cannot be stilled. A new vessel must be chosen."---_

_---"Use the conquerer." ---_

Bonnie shuddered, hands reaching to cradle her head.

_---"Not a blessing, nor a curse." ---_

_---"Use the conquerer." ---_

Her chest heaved painfully on breath, her body tight.

_---"Not a blessing, nor a curse." ---_

_---"The new vessel."__---_

The noise overwhelmed her, breaking her senses.

_---"Not a blessing, nor a curse." ---_

_---"Use the conquerer. Guardian to the Power." ---_

Ruptured her.

_---"Chosen." ---_

A scream, silent and empty flared in the shadowy dark. The cold that Bonnie had escaped in the reality of her sickbed now found her on the psychic plane and raced in to recapture her hands, her arms, her feet and legs. Cold chased up along her nerves until her entire body was solidified and frozen, with her mouth opened in that scream that held no sound.

Then, the ice cracked on the outside, and Bonnie fell endlessly into empty blackness and her awareness escaped one more time.

- - - - -

The cold was gone by the time she woke, truly woke in her bedroom of her parents home. No longer shivering, and her head and body not quite aching as it had before, she crept from the bed on surprisingly weak limbs. 'Oh, that was a weird dream.' A shudder crept through her, and Bonnie pressed her forehead against the doorframe. 'With an imagination like mine, I should write horror novels.'

Sighing deeply, she pulled herself through the door and cautiously approached the stairs. The house was dark and still, although by glancing at the windows visible through the stair-rail, Bonnie could see the sun had long since set. "I slept through the whole day?" She muttered, her forehead furrowing with puzzled confusion. "Wow."

Rolling her neck, she winced as it cricked and then made a pop sound while she padded her way to the kitchen, her woolen socks soundless on the hardwood flooring. "Wonder if Mom and Dad went out?" She muttered, flicking the light-switch and wincing as the bright florescent lighting hit her, making her eyes water so much so that she instinctively shaded them with her hands until her vision adjusted.

The answering machine had an insistent red flash, sitting beside the fridge on the countertop. Glancing at it with only mild curiosity, Bonnie detoured for the sink and a cold glass of water, then leisurely reached for the machine while sipping the tasteless water. It wasn't her favorite beverage, but since she'd been sick all day she didn't want to push her body too hard.

-Beep-

'Hey Bons, it's Meredith and you-know-who. Your Mom called us. Hope you're feeling better. Didn't you say your parents had a dance, and that your sister was working? We'll come over later and check on you.'

-Beep-

'Hey Bons, Matt. Meredith called. Take it easy, huh?'

-Beep-

'Hello Bonnie, it's Stefan. Not to be an imposition, but I will be joining Meredith and E...everyone this evening. Your illness may be related to last nights... ah... exuberance. Take care of yourself. If there is anything I can do to help, you have my cellphone number.'

-Beep-

_--'Not a blessing, nor a curse. Thou has been chosen and the change has begun.'--_

The glass fell from nerveless fingers, shattering all over the floor. With a stricken sob, Bonnie hit the button on the machine, rolling the message back.

- Mweep. Beep -

'End of Messages.' The automatic voice played, denying the existence of that last message.

'No. No and No!' Bonnie stared at it, reading the counter of just three messages. 'I'm dreaming. I have to be. This isn't real.' The stress fed into her system, churning her stomach up horridly. 'Maybe... Klaus had allies, or it's a practical joke. Caroline?'

Caroline wasn't prone to jokes like this. She was too... snobby for lowering herself to such eerie standards. Besides, after everything she'd gone through, there was no way she'd indulge in this kind if psycho sickness.

But... what if there were other Originals who'd want vengeance on Klaus? Wouldn't they go after Elena and Stefan too? Why her? She just summoned the host... okay, so maybe she was the power that caused Klaus' downfall, but she hadn't done it alone.

'Maybe I'm imagining things?' Bonnie thought bleakly, stepping forward and hearing something crunch. She blinked, brown eyes confused and looked down, the bright shards of shattered glass around her foot, and a slow moving puddle of red drifting out from under her gray woolen sock. Understanding came in a flash, and she hopped backwards and away, using the heel of her foot on the ground until she found a seat.

A big shard a glass was wedged through the sock and into her foot, only now hurting with a throbbing ache and a rising tide of nausea to see her blood flowing so freely. Red on white floor, it looked like a fine spilt wine. Her fingers on her foot came away vibrantly red and without thinking, she stuck her finger into her mouth and licked the blood up. Ambrosia.

"What am I doing?" She shuddered, jerking the finger away. "Gross. Gross and gross. Oh god, that's bleeding bad." Her tongue snaked out and licked her lips, tasting the salty trace of blood while she forced her shaky hands back to her foot. One hand bracing her heel, and the other resting on the glass. Her fingers tightened around the shard, feeling the glass pinch into skin but not cut. "One." She breathed. "Two. Three." Savagely, she wrenched the shard out.

It was huge. A big round curve of the glass at least four inches in width and long. Very long and coated richly with her blood. Mesmerized by the red trails and patterns forming on the glass, her head tilted sideways, eyes becoming unfocused and distant for a moment before she shook her mind free. 'No passing out!'

The gash was deep, slowly oozing rich red blood across the pale flesh of her foot. At least three inches long, it had thick lips on either side and she knew instinctively that it needed stitches.

"Oh, God." She murmured, blotting the discarded sock against it. "What do I do?"

Logic kicked in instinctively. Apply pressure to stop the wound from bleeding and keep her leg up above heart level. That would slow the blood loss. Thankful, suddenly, for all of Mary's endless nursing prattle, Bonnie tugged out another chair and placed her foot high on the back, pressing her foot firmly against the back and the sock that covered it.

Once in position, she realized the futility of it all. It wasn't like she could tell if the bleeding stopped and if the bleeding didn't then she would pass out. Additionally, the phone was across the room so she couldn't call for help without opening the wound more and there was no way she could get to the hospital like this. Mary had the nightshift, her parents were out and Elena and Meredith wouldn't be arriving for at least another hour. "I'm so screwed." She sighed.

Slumping down in the chair, her knees bending, she placed her heart below her raised leg, and absently reached for her neck to check her pulse. 'I could go into shock after all this.' She thought absently. 'That's creepy, identifying what could happen to yourself. Sick.'

Fumbling around, it took some work to find that vein that throbbed in rhythm to an oddly very placid heartbeat. 'Is that a good thing?' Oh well, if her heart wasn't speeding up, she wasn't pumping more blood out of her body.

'At least I'm not cold.' A sigh gusted from her, weary and drained of any inspiration. Everything just felt gloomy. The brief burst of joy at Elena's return had faded quickly, almost like someone was snuffing out the flame on a candle, her candle, while romping around that moonlit clearing.

Maybe it was the way Damon had departed, or the aftermath of the high. Facing Klaus with adrenaline that had left her body slumping in exhaustion with terrible tremors to the ground after shouting and dancing about Elena. Still, that exhaustion lingered, and the world around her was gray in tint, the lights doing nothing to give vibrancy to the things she saw.

Worse, there was a growing yearning inside that she couldn't identify. A sharp keening want for something that wasn't material or food. 'Not hungry.' She realized with a small pang of surprise. 'Slept all day, haven't had a thing to eat since yesterday, and I'm still not hungry. That can't be good.'

And then there was that dream and that eerie message. The world was askew and she wasn't sure whether it was all some twisted dream or if it was real. Within a world that held ancient vampires, werewolves and ghosts returning from the dead, there was no guarantee that this wasn't reality.

Or that everything that she associated with last night, or this past year wasn't a dream. "Ridiculous." She tried scolding herself, half-heartedly. "Last night was real. Elena was real. Everything that has happened has been painfully real."

It was... all of it, a painful bittersweet and exhausting experience. Maybe that was why everything felt so wacky, why she felt so off. Her mind was shielding her body until she was ready to deal with all that had happened. Wasn't she ready? Hadn't she already dealt?

"I'm so confused." Bonnie pressed her hands to her face, closing her eyes to stave off tears of depression. "I don't understand what's happening, or why, and I'm alone. I feel alone." The last came out in a whisper.

Elena had Stefan, Meredith had Alaric - regardless of how far away he was, and if she was honest with herself, the friendship between her and Matt was no more intense than it had been while he'd been dating Elena. Matt's heart would always rest with Elena. That's the way it was, and there was no way Bonnie was willing to serve as second best.

Head tucking close to her collarbone, the tears came no matter how hard she tried to deny them, and her arms wrapped tightly around her body as shoulders started to shake slightly. Just like the dream, she felt alone and surrounded by empty nothingness. She didn't matter, nothing mattered. It was all bleak pointlessness.

So what if she bled to death? Who'd really care?

Wrapped up in her misery, for God knew how long, she never heard the knock on the door. Nor the sounds of people coming in. Consciousness was receding, her depression and blood loss easing her mind away from her body once again. Drifting, lost and alone with no point to existence and no reason to continue living.

"BONNIE!" Stefan's psychic presence roared into her head, sharp green eyes delving deeply into red-rimmed brown as he tilted her chin up and fed her miniscule amounts of his power just to break into her hysteric depression. "What happened?" He asked, audible voice gentle, but eyes none the less penetrating.

"S...stefan?" She hiccuped his name in a whisper of a breath, too weary to offer more.

"And Elena." Spoke the blond from behind, a gentle hand stroked Bonnie's head. "What happened Bonnie? Are you okay?"

"Your foot needs stitches." Stefan informed her, directing her attention to the foot now resting flat on the seat of the chair, properly bound with bandages and packed with ice around it to prevent further bleeding. "Meredith is getting the car closer."

"Meredith?" Again, stuck with one-word questions.

"She found you, Bonnie." Elena soothed, her hands still stroking Bonnie's red hair with the soothing concern of a maternal touch. "What happened?"

"Glass... I dropped a glass." Bonnie murmured. "And I stood on a shard."

Stefan flinched, "Why didn't you call for help?" He took her hand gently, holding it tightly, while Elena wrapped an arm about Bonnie's shoulders and took the chair beside her, pulling it close.

"Didn't know I had... stepped on it..." Bonnie's voice trailed off, her lower lip caught between her teeth. "Didn't feel real. Nothing does." Looking back across the kitchen floor, she could see her blood trailing in thick streaks along the tiling. "I'm cold again." She realized. Her gaze drifted back up to spot Elena's concerned blue eyes and Stefan's closely guarded expression.

Wordlessly, Stefan took off his heavy coat and draped it around Bonnie, fingers nimbly securing it. "You're probably in shock." He mused, studying her alarmingly white face, made more ghastly by the redness around her eyes. "You're heartbeat is sluggish, you've lost quite a bit of blood, but I think you'll be okay once we get you to the hospital."

Elena made a small sound, as if to speak, but stopped at a glance from her beloved. "I'll go see if Meredith is ready." She murmured, dropping a gentle kiss on Bonnie's head and slipping away quietly.

Stefan nodded, still squatting beside Bonnie, those eyes so sharp and intent it was frightening. "Bonnie, I want you to think hard. This is important. Did... anything happen to you when you were alone with Klaus?" He asked, one hand closing upon her pale motionless hand on her lap.

Bonnie shook her head. "No."

"You're sure?" Stefan persisted. "You feel... I'm not strong, you know that, with my powers, but my senses read you differently now."

Her throat stuck on a swallow. It was a huge knot of tension she couldn't quite swallow. "Different?" She squeaked, thinking only of her dream. "Like how?"

Stefan's head tilted. "Like something... I don't know, like something in your power, something inside has changed. Altered."

_'Thou hast been chosen and the change begun.'_

Nausea rose in her like a tidal wave and Bonnie scrambled to stand, pushing Stefan away when he tried to stop her. Dizzy, nauseated and horrified, she nearly fell as she ran to the sink, barely grasping on the counter and leaning over the metal basin before her stomach relieved it's churning contents.

"Bonnie!" Stefan was there in a heartbeat, helping her stand, rubbing her back and turning on the water to rinse out the sink and cast a soothing mist on her face. "I don't like this." She heard him mutter in a low voice, meant only for his ears.

'You don't? And I do?' She thought scornfully, miserably, to herself.

Stefan's head jerked. 'Bonnie?' His voice echoed in her mind. 'Can you hear me?'

"Yes." She groaned, her stomach heaving again. New hands touched her, smaller more effeminate, and she knew by touch and some other instinct that it was Meredith and Elena who now surrounded her. Stefan was receding away, his presence fading from her awareness not completely, but becoming slightly more distant, his thoughts vague and mind clouding over with the distance and some mental blinds to shield his thoughts.

"She's making it bleed worse." Meredith's steadying voice was far away, not nearly as close as Stefan's had been echoing in her head. It was distinctively separate from her, and for that, it was soothing. "We have to get her into the car."

Sound was like color and images. All was racing too fast into a collage of flashing light and color. It was raw noise and it was assaulting her head, it was blinding lights and it was burning her eyes, it was confusion and chaos and it was tormenting her stomach. It was pain and fatigue, and it was draining her dry.

"Bucket." A fragment peeked into her head.

"Let... carry." The world lurched, and Bonnie tightly clenched her eyes close to still the dizziness that spun her senses around.

There was power nearby, weak and thin, but a steadying power that she reached out to and touched in search of balance. Walls sprung up to deny her, and she made a pitiful little cry at the denial. Instinct deep within knew that power would heal her, and in the loss of that medicine, she let her mind find true release and passed out completely.

- - - - -

It was night when she awoke, late night with all the lights dimmed and the sterile peep of a machine giving the only continuous sign of activity that she could see. The room was a small white square, cluttered with only machines and the narrow bed she lay in.

'I'm strapped down?' Bonnie thought her forehead furrowing in concentration to identify the heavy tubular object along her right arm. 'No. IV.' The point of entry hurt, like the needle inserted in was forcing her skin to reopen a consistently healing wound. 'Why?'

Almost in a daze, she reached with a leaden arm and jerked the IV out, before lifting her body upright and swinging her feet over the edge of the narrow bed. 'Hospital.' She realized, seeing the blue plain gown on her body and the metal rails about the bed, lowered fortunately. 'I'm in a hospital.'

Her knees were weak, body limp, and blood trailed down her arm from the ripped IV insertion but still she found her way to her feet and struggled towards the bathroom. 'I feel weirder, not better. What's wrong with me?' Hands fumbling, she switched the light on, and her eyes instantly formed tears in reaction to the assaulting brightness. Using the back of her hands, she rubbed at them, squinting until she could see the fixtures without hindrance.

The plain porcelain sink and toilet in sterile white with black trim on the toilet seat. A small shelf for soap and towels just above the sink, with a mirror above that. Her body and mind vague and rather lacking in clarity, she swung her eyes to the mirror and took in the translucent skin and limp hair. It was just right that her reflection was almost transparent... she felt like a ghost or something that wasn't altogether there.

Reaching out with one hand, she touched the mirror, surprised to feel the cold surface beneath her hand. 'It's solid?' Bonnie stretched fingers out to trail in a wide web down the surface, absently watching the markings form on the clean glass. 'It is.' Her eyes flicked back to her reflection, and she froze.

It was gone. Her face, her body, disappeared from the image in the mirror and then suddenly reappearing. 'I'm dreaming. I'm dreaming. I'm dreaming.' She thought frantically, her mind sudden jerked awake. 'This isn't real.'

_---"Vanquished and conquered, the power cannot be stilled. A new vessel must be chosen."---_

_---"Use the conquerer."---_

_---"Not a blessing, nor a curse."---_

The words filtered back to her mind, and with a sudden burst of insight came understanding. Apparently, Mr. Kalfus' Grade eleven physics class hadn't been completely forgotten. Conservation of energy said that energy couldn't be destroyed, just transferred. And, since power was energy, it was an absolute. It couldn't be unmade or destroyed. It had to have a home or an outlet, and if the original source was destroyed, the power was moved and transferred elsewhere as part of the process.

Klaus was destroyed. Klaus. An Original. A Vampire's vampire. "Oh, dear God."

The entire fact it wasn't a blessing, but defended as not a curse was to sooth her own growing horror. Bonnie's hands slid away from the mirror and sink to cup her own face, sliding down along cheekbones to jaw.

_---'Thou has been chosen and the change has begun.'---_

"Oh no... no."

_---'Nothing living can stand against him.'---_

Only, she had stood against him and lived. Or so she had thought. The sentence wasn't right! Meredith's grandfather had been too confused and too disoriented to phrase the truth of what facing and defeating Klaus truly meant. It wasn't that as a living human she stood no chance against Klaus, but that the price of defeating him was her mortality.

The Old Ones, the Originals were not like Stefan or Damon. They were not made, they simply were. Chosen and created by the power and fabric of the universe for some other purpose. By defeating Klaus, by using her powers to summon the host of the dead and Elena, Bonnie had unwittingly accepted the mantle of responsibility.

The change had begun. This was the genesis of the Originals. They weren't made like other vampires. They were humans that came into being by power.

'I can't... they...' Her mind desperately held tight to the fragments of rationality that it could find. Hand to her throat, she felt the beat of her heart and knew it to be unnaturally slow. Her mind and body was afraid, horrified at what it was realizing; her pulse should have been racing.

Her reflection was hovering uncertainly between visible and invisible, but already was transparent. How would she explain this to Stefan, maybe he already suspected given on how he was already sensing her change. And, what about Elena or Meredith? They'd look at her like she was becoming a monster.

She was, wasn't she?

Hunching back against the cold wall, her eyes closed tightly and a soft croon of loss echoed in the room around her. It wasn't right. This wasn't fair. She wanted to live her life, to see the world, have a family and die in her own good time.

'Can't stay here.' The thought dawned suddenly, slamming through the white picket fence and pretty little house she pictured as her own. 'Have to leave Fell's Church... find someplace safe.'

There was so much she had to come to grips with. If she was becoming a monster, she had to protect her family and friends by doing whatever it took. Maybe Klaus was just insane, though. There had to be more Originals out there, and perhaps finding them would give her clues as to what was happening to herself.

Maybe she wasn't becoming an Original, but something different. Until she could find out, she'd never know. And, by that, she didn't mean sticking around here until she finally snapped and killed someone.

No. To save herself and her loved ones she had to leave.


	2. Chapter 2

**Conservation**

_By Anya (aka Evilgoddss)_

**Part Two**

Elena pulled her coat tighter about her body, discreetly lowering her eyes in proper reverential respect for the newly dead. Clustered in the cemetery like a horde of gargoyles, she couldn't help but notice the weather truly suited this sad occasion.

Ahead of her, she saw Alaric wrap a supportive arm around Meredith, and her heart pulled painfully for her friend. Loosing a child was horrible. It wasn't an experience Elena knew personally, but it was one she could empathize with. After all, she had been just as excited as Meredith about this baby. Auntie Elena had a wonderful ring to it.

Something, though, had gone wrong. In her seventh month of pregnancy, Meredith had experienced discomfort and pain, so the doctors were monitoring her carefully. She'd taken an early leave of absence from the labs she worked at, and had been faithful about taking things easy.

It wasn't her fault. No matter how Meredith wanted to blame herself, she wasn't accountable for the effect a nightmare could have. Especially a nightmare which featured Klaus at his nightmarishly worst.

"You okay?" Stefan's whisper shook her from her thoughts, chasing away the unholy aspect of the blond hair and insane blue eyes of Klaus.

"No." She murmured honestly, curling closer to his supportive body. They had to remain in the back of the group, discretely unnoticeable. Time was creeping against them, and soon she didn't know what would become of their relationship. He looked barely eighteen, whereas she was approaching twenty-three. "This is so unfair."

He made a soft sound of soothing compassion, his presence more reassuring than anything else could ever be. The best Elena could hope for was that Meredith would find that kind of comfort from Alaric.

It was times like this she wished she had Bonnie's empathic nature. Or Bonnie's psychic abilities. Determining if Klaus had visited Meredith's dreams intentionally or if it was a random nightmare was on everyone's thoughts, but without Bonnie, Elena didn't see how it could be done. Even Stefan admitted it was beyond his limited abilities.

"I wish I knew where she was." She whispered, knowing Stefan would understand what she was getting at.

He nodded, his chin brushing her shoulder on the down sweep. "I know."

"I'd even forgive her for disappearing like that."

Well, after a few hours of yelling and screaming at her, that was. Bonnie's disappearance had left both Meredith and herself in hysterical tears for weeks. Stefan had nearly gone mad trying to reassure them that Klaus was not back, and only time with it's gradual trod helped ease their pained hearts. After all, if no body was found in four weeks or six months, well... the longer absence of foul play was found, the more unlikely foul play occurred. It still didn't explain why Bonnie would disappear from the hospital at two in the morning, but it gave the hope that she had done so of her own free will and very much alive.

Now, if only they could find her.

"They're moving away. Come on." Stefan gently set his hand beneath her elbow and eased her out of the path, allowing Meredith and Alaric to pass first, and falling in behind their respective parents and families.

As much as everyone wanted answers, now and tonight was not the time to look for them. Given that, the plan was to let Meredith and Elena have quiet time together on the weekend, while Stefan and Alaric trekked out to the old field to see if there was any sign of Klaus.

Stefan had even been drinking human blood in preparation, just to raise his strength up to sense anything unusual or unnatural. The odds that Klaus would leave a field upturned or corpses lying around were remote. More than likely the Original would go to ground and plot revenge.

"I almost hope it was Klaus' fault." Elena whispered, her sorrowful eyes fixed on the back of Meredith's bowed head. The dark haired woman's remorse and assumed guilt was palpable.

"I..." Stefan's voice broke off, his hand tightening on Elena's arm as he jerked them both to a stop. Head back and eyes searching the overhanging trees, he was a predator looking for prey.

"Stefan?" Elena searched the skies with her weak human eyes. "What is it?"

His head tilted, eyes narrowed with concentration. "Vampire." He muttered, trying to pierce the leaf-heavy trees to spot the predator nearby. "Something's here."

"Vampire? Is it Damon?" Eyes wide, Elena took a step backwards. "Where?"

Stefan shook his head. "I don't know... maybe. Whoever it is, he's trying to hide." A small arrogant smile swept across the younger Salvatore's face. "Not doing a good job of it, obviously he believes that I'm too young or not strong enough to sense him."

Elena shook her head, not really wishing to endure a display of testosterone from two vampire brothers. "Let's just go." She said, raising her voice just loud enough so that whoever it was, where ever he was, could hear her. "If it's Damon and he wants to talk to us, he's welcome to meet us at the house later." Head up, shoulders back, she had the regal tone and bearing of a Queen.

Pinning Stefan briefly with a look, she turned and walked off briskly, Stefan immediately following. Assuming it was his brother, and that he was just too distant to sense clearly, then Damon's timing was wretched, and yet perfect. If Klaus had escaped his supernatural prison, that gave two Salvatore brothers, both at full strength fit to stand against the Original.

Making, of course, another assumption in that Damon Salvatore hadn't decided to diet in the past five years.

They cleared down the hillside to the few cars in the small lot, theirs being the sleek foreign model in a sea full of North America cars. The glossy black Porsche, with tinted windows was more than a sign of wealth, it was as much a predator as Stefan was. It also eased the irritation that sunlight did provide him.

With his back to the hillside, he paused at her door and opened it gallantly. Both to protect her with his body between her and the vampire somewhere behind them, and to play the perfect gentleman that he was.

'Ever St. Stefan,' Elena thought with a rueful smile. 'Defending the weak and guarding the town.' In her opinion, he should have run for mayor in last year's elections. However, reality did intrude on her conceit, and she recognized that his apparent youth would not get him any votes from the community.

Sinking down into her seat, she dropped her purse onto the floor and let her mind wander, eyes drifting to the window as if expecting Damon to materialize right in front of her.

He didn't, though. Only heavy gray clouds and the bleak darkness of the world beyond reflecting off of the tombstones and gravemarkers filled her sight. There was nothing living or undead beyond. Even the grass seemed lost of life, just as much as the cut flowers and wreaths adorning the graves, or the newly turned earth that covered over little Bethany Saltzman.

It was a barren world, lifeless and oppressing. The perfect herald for Klaus to return in. "What do we do if Klaus is back?" She murmured quietly, not really expecting an answer. It was hypothetical anyway.

Bonnie wasn't here to summon the host of the dead, and she was no longer their representative. Besides, it wasn't like that had worked if Klaus was free.

"We'll cross that bridge when we come to it." Came Stefan's sage wisdom. "First, let's just find out if this was Klaus' doing at all." That was easily enough done. Wait two weeks and count the bodies.

It was the waiting that was painful.

"I wish..." Elena's voice trailed away, subdued. There was nothing she could define as a solid wish. Just a lot of vague impressions. That the baby hadn't died, that Bonnie hadn't left, that she wasn't aging while Stefan stayed young. A lot of little wishes that all collided into one solid thing: that life was different.

"Me too." Stefan reached out with one hand to catch hers. "Me too."

What more could be said? He knew the score too. Could he see her aging inch by wrinkled inch before his very eyes? Did it depress him? Worry him? Did he wonder how people would look at them, or more to the point, if it would premature his departure from Fell's Church and from her?

It was hard enough reintegrating back into society. The pose of being kidnapped and only recently escaping with her beloved Stefan's faithful help had been shaky to issue, but Fell's Church didn't want the truth, they accepted artifice gladly. So, the body they had found had been Katherine Von Swartzhild, who they thought had been dead from drowning before, but wasn't...

Whatever the story, her family had welcomed her back tearfully. Little Margaret wasn't so little anymore and Elena had smoothly begun her adult life with Stefan knowing Aunt Judith and her now-Uncle Robert gave their blessing.

'Life should have been perfect.' She mused darkly. 'Only, everything went wrong.' Bonnie had disappeared the same night as her hospitalization. The IV had been ripped out and left to lie bloodily on the pristine white bed sheets, and the mirror in the bathroom for her room had been shattered. Overall, her disappearance sent them all into a downward spiral. It was only weeks later that Stefan admitted to feeling some weird vibes from Bonnie the day of her disappearance, and suspecting Klaus had something to do with it.

Matt had lost it then. Embracing the Fell's Church denial syndrome, he'd blocked out Stefan's vampiric status, forgotten Damon, werewolves and Klaus altogether and moved off to State University and a promising football career.

The tragedy was, he'd even forgotten Bonnie. A girl he'd known since Kindergarten and who Elena had seriously thought he'd find love with. They'd seemed so close, the night she'd been restored, and Meredith had said -- well. Then again, Matt had caught Damon about to prey on Bonnie and told Meredith. Conjecture being what it was, Meredith could have been looking for stars where none were even if it weren't normally in her nature to do so.

Still. First Bonnie, then Matt, both of them keystones in her life. Meredith had moved away to join Alaric at Duke's University, only returning shortly after her marriage. It had almost been normal, happy... enough to forget the losses and embrace the future when Meredith announced her pregnancy.

"You're thinking too hard." Stefan teased, squeezing her hand quickly.

Elena blinked, drawn back into the real world just in time to see City hall's tall stone tower and antique clock pass by in a blur. Cemetery to downtown, all while she was in the twilight zone. Thank goodness it was Stefan who had been driving! "I guess I was." She smiled halfheartedly.

"Don't do that." He advised, with a warm spark in his eyes. "We'll start blaming the weather directly on you if you don't perk up." The love, trust and compassion radiating brightly from him was comforting. So what if he looked scarcely twenty-one, so young and youthful. Right now, so did she. The truth was, Stefan was centuries older and far maturer than even she was or could be.

Yet, he loved her. He deliberately related to her, trusted her and would cheerfully die for her, not that she would ever ask that of him. He was everything she wanted, and everything she needed and somehow she would have to learn to live without him if they didn't find a way to overcome her aging body.

"I love you." Elena murmured. An almost tearful smile crossed her face as she gazed at his profile, noting the strong nose and olive skin that was his heritage as a son of a Italian noble. He was so beautiful, so amazing and she couldn't conceive of loving anyone like she did him.

One dark eyebrow arched. "And I you, but what brings on this sudden declaration, cara mia?" His lips twitched, an almost playful expression on his face. "Should I be worried?"

"Never that." Elena turned again, gazing out the window as the car turned on to Raleigh Drive. "Just showing my appreciation for you because life is a strange uncertain thing."

Stefan didn't reply, rather the car slowed down and made the gentle turn into a crowded driveway of cars. Meredith's family and Alaric's sister were on the walkway up to the house. Presumably Meredith and Alaric had already arrived for the reception.

What a dumb idea, inundate those grieving so painfully with people and the requirement of socially receiving them. Frankly, Elena was amazed at Meredith's strength and willpower just to see this through with composure and grace. "We won't stay long, right?" She muttered quietly, knowing Stefan would hear her.

"No." He agreed, understanding what she was saying. "Just long enough to let Meredith and Alaric know we care."

"Right." Sighing, she swung her legs out the car, pausing to look across the vibrantly green lawn with the immaculate trim and delicate but perfect gardens. This was the starting ground for Meredith's married life with Alaric. Their first home together, where they would set the foundations for the rest of their lives, with their children and extended family about them.

It was something she would never share with Stefan. Another sigh rose up in her heart, but she stifled it back and stood up, straightening her shoulders to shrug off her own personal grief. This wasn't the time or the place for such things.

Purse on her shoulder, she reached out for Stefan's hand and smiled as he squeezed her fingers reassuringly. "I wish Bonnie were here." She reiterated, for the second time.

"And Matt."

"Heck, even Caroline." Elena smiled, picturing the elegant posturing her sometimes friend Caroline postured with. A trip to New York and sheer blind luck had landed the girl a position in a prestigious modeling firm.

"I don't think I'd go quite that far." Stefan chuckled. "Let's be reasonable." Slipping his hand from hers, he wrapped an arm about her waist. "She gave me funny looks after Klaus was defeated and you returned."

Elena shrugged, stepping up onto the stairs for the front porch. "She gave everybody those looks. Did you see her expression when she looked at Bonnie?"

Oh, that was one of the most indelible memories. The sheer awed, slack jawed and worried look on Caroline's face as Bonnie emerged from her hug with Elena. Followed immediately with the: "Did you do THAT too?"

Bonnie had very nearly acquired her first High Priestess in that simple memorable moment.

"Hard to miss." Stefan smiled. "Very hard to miss." Sharing a smile and a bright memory of bemusement eased some of the tension in the day. Knowing this, Stefan gently pressed the doorbell button, confident that he and Elena would be fine and supportive.

Feet, many feet, scampered against the floor, barking echoing loudly closer and closer to the door. "I didn't know they had a dog." Stefan frowned.

"Me either." Elena's face portrayed her puzzlement, the fine furrow in her forehead and narrowed concern in her eyes cute, but concerned. "Meredith never mentioned a dog... maybe it's her in-laws."

"Back Penny!" Alaric's voice was stern and commanding, but dulled by the thick wooden door that lay between him and them. "Back. Sit. Good girl!"

"Penny?" Elena smiled, head tilting to the side as Alaric opened the door. "A new houseguest?"

"New member of the family, actually." Alaric smiled too, but his eyes didn't share the expression. "She was wandering around in the neighborhood a week or so ago with a hurt paw. Meredith just fell in love with her and thought she'd be a wonderful companion for -- for Bethany."

"Meredith?" The incredulous note in both of their voices wasn't missed, nor was the sorrow shared for the lost child.

Alaric shrugged helplessly. "I blame hormones." He rolled his eyes, but a grin crept across his face. "Still, no one's responded to the found dog ads, and she's a sweet dog. I think it's Penny who's helping Meredith get over this the most."

Penny, it turned out, was a huge red Irish Setter. Her big beautiful brown eyes were soulful and loving, even as the tail swished energetically across the floor. There was something so warm, so open and so appealing about the dog, that Elena felt her own heart tug in earnest just looking at her. "Hey, girl..." She cooed, a hand outstretched with palm up.

Penny darted a quick look at Alaric, and crept very carefully towards Elena, her nose sniffing and tongue at the ready for a judicious lick. Once the formality of a first-meeting was past, though, Elena sank to her knees and just rubbed the soft coat of the dog. "How old is she?" She asked.

"Three, we think." Alaric answered, taking Stefan's coat from the vampire and hanging it up in the closet. "Hard to tell."

The coat was vibrant and well brushed which was a sign of dwelling in Meredith's household for certain. There were no white hairs, no graying around the muzzle and no other signs to suggest great age. Yet, Penny was definitely full-grown. She was comfortable in her own size and shape and moved deftly, not with the clumsiness of a young adult or a puppy. "She's so sweet." Elena cooed as she clamored to her feet, responding to Stefan's tugs for her jacket.

"We're not getting a dog." Stefan informed her, tartly tapping his finger on her nose. "They don't like me."

It wasn't quite true. Or rather, Penny was the exception to that rule as she made a great job of sliding up against Stefan's leg and giving herself a good shoulder rub pushing by him. "She does." Elena giggled, reaching out to scratch once at the dog's rump.

Stefan just snorted, casting a wary glance at the dog. "She's setting me up for a bite later." He predicted.

Much to Elena's delight, Penny chose that moment to look over her shoulder at Stefan, her jaws parted in a canine grin.

"Yes." Elena agreed with giggle. "That must be it. Rolling her eyes at his foolishness, Elena grabbed his arm and tugged him into the living room, letting Alaric deal with Penny as he chose. "You just don't want a pet." She countered.

"Nope. I'm all the pet we need." He grinned, his face sobering instantly as his eyes met Meredith's.

Elena disentangled herself from him and let the role of social queen fall upon her graceful shoulders. In mere minutes, she had shifted the focus of people so that she was playing hostess and freeing Meredith up to receive people's honest sympathy, yet find time and space to breath between people.

Stefan just did what any other good man would do. He found a corner, crossed his arms and set up a defensive perimeter known as a frown. In these circumstances, when he was somewhat hungry and surrounded by hordes of delicious smelling humans, he always found the frown to be the best way to scare people off.

Neither Meredith nor Alaric would take offense. They understood the ramifications of Stefan's apparent hostility. In fact, they encouraged it. Each had a relative or two that they were happy to have sucked dry, but family being what it was, prudence came first.

Besides, right now, he had better things to do than bemoan than the tragic loss of a baby and the simple perfection of the funeral. There was nothing ever perfect about a funeral, in his honest opinion. How could there be, the loved one was not there to share the moment.

Casting him a final look full of bemused love, Elena left him to his devices. "Let me take that..." She urged Meredith, her hand sweeping under a tray of small sandwiches. "Tell me where you want the food, I'll put it out. You go sit and cuddle your husband or puppy."

"I can..." Meredith's protest was half-hearted. Shadows under her eyes and the lackluster limpness to her hair were so unlike the slender composed woman Elena had grown up with that they shrieked volumes about the pain echoing in Meredith's heart.

"You can go find peace and comfort from your family." Elena's voice brooked no arguments. "Let me do this for you." She wheedled, as Meredith's back straightened and her eyes flashed a fire fit for fighting.

Penny, conveniently chose that moment to intervene. Her red head and cold nose bumping into Meredith's hand in a demanding request for attention. Either all dogs were skillful manipulators, or Penny was just exceptionally gifted because Meredith melted immediately. Animal or human, Elena had deep appreciation of the skill.

"Oh, Penny." Meredith sighed, sinking to a crouch, arms wrapping around Penny's neck and her face buried in the soft fur. "I've been ignoring you today, haven't I sweetie?"

Nothing like a helpless creature to bring out the nurturing aspects of a person. Looking down at the dog and woman, Elena found her eyes fixed on the steady brown gaze of the Setter. Maybe it was just her imagination, but she could have sworn Penny winked at her.

Shaking her head, and her mind for such foolish thoughts, Elena broke eye contact and forced herself to pragmatic reality. "I'll look after serving the food and beverages, Mere. Just do what you have to." Casting one more glance at the composed dog receiving lavish attention and small platitudes from her Mistress, Elena turned away more than a little disturbed by her wandering thoughts. Penny just seemed so uncannily... human.

It was the empathy the dog displayed, she decided an hour later as she refilled the punch bowl and made passing small-talk with Mrs. Saltzman, Alaric's mother. Penny seemed deftly aware of the touch and timing needed to keep Meredith on an even keel.

She had a soothing presence, and a sense of love for life, laughter and happiness just radiated from her body. 'Kind of like Bonnie.' Elena's mouth trembled on the verge of a laugh, just thinking of how outraged her friend would have been to be compared to a dog.

But, the most endearing qualities Bonnie held were present in the most selfless loving creature mankind had ever domesticated. Bonnie had been loyal to a fault, steadfast in her faith of her friends, willing to sacrifice anything for them and just as giving in kindness and empathy. Perhaps she had been a trifle naive at times, but overall, Bonnie was the person you found sympathetic comfort in, a shoulder always ready to receive a good cry on.

Maybe she was personifying Penny, but that was just how Elena saw the situation. From the burnished red coat to the warm brown eyes, it was like seeing Bonnie's soul. 'I have really got Bonnie on the brain today.' She shook her head slightly, apparently just at the right moment to agree with some subject that Mrs. Saltzman disapproved heartily on.

"Elena." Her head snapped around at the sound of her voice. Eyes widening in shock to recognize the blond hair and pained blue eyes in front of her.

"Oh, my god! Matt!" It was too bizarre to be true. "You're here! You came."

His shrug was a limp thing, pathetic for a State Champion football star. In fact, all of him seemed limp, lifeless and resigned. Tired in body, spirit and more if Elena had to describe him. "Yeah. Reality slapped me in the face, and I had to come home. I had to be here for Meredith."

There was no pause or hesitation in her response. Abandoning Mrs. Saltzman completely, she wrapped her arms about his neck though she needed to lift herself onto her tiptoes just to reach his neck. Squeezing tightly, she felt his arms wrap hesitantly around her, pulling her close for a hug long overdue and grossly needed. "Oh, I missed you!" She breathed, little shivers of joy just sailing through her spine. It was just as poignant as the reunion they had shared in that dewy field so many months ago.

"Me too." He muttered, chin down but still no where near her shoulder. "I'm sorry. I was a prick."

Her laugh didn't contradict him, but said all was forgiven. "Have you seen Meredith?" She asked as she pulled back. "Or Stefan?"

Matt's hands clung to hers, his face still thin and tired, but more open and alert with the healing balm of her forgiveness to nurse new life into his body. "I saw Alaric and Stefan. They're guarding the front door, I think."

Hiding, he meant. "But, not Meredith." Elena summarized, squeezing one hand and giving a tug to make him follow her. Her gaze swept the still populated room, noting that some of the earlier crowd had faded away but there was still a lot of family lurking about. 'Like buzzards waiting for dinner,' She thought uncharitably.

In the small little pass-through to the dining room, she spotted a familiar dark head. "She's really going to be happy to see you." Elena murmured, steering past people and furniture, dragging the huge hulking mass that was Matt Honeycutt behind her.

"Uh huh." Ever the skeptic, he left his comment at that. "Is that a dog?"

Elena giggled at his incredulous tone. "Yup. That's Penny." It felt nice to be the one with all the answers for a change. "She's been Meredith's saving grace."

"I see." There was a hidden laugh in his voice. "How's Meredith been..." His voice trailed off at Elena's warning squeeze.

"Mere... look who I found!" She called out instead of answering.

It was a light and dark mirror reflection of her reunion with Matt. First, Meredith's eyes went hugely wide, then her jaw dropped in shock and before Matt knew what had hit him, his composed and reserved friend had him in the bear-hug of the century. Penny pranced around the two of them as if the entire debacle had been of her making.

"Hey, Meredith." Matt croaked on his first breath of air after she released him. "You should go for the WWF. You've got a great choke hold!"

In perfect harmony both women swatted his arm, one left and one right. "Oooh! You! Big man on a campus and he comes back here with an attitude." Elena teased, deliberately keeping everything light just for Meredith.

His smile was lopsided, eyes finally showing a spark of the boy they'd grown up with. "It's a tough job, but someone has to do it." He informed them loftily. "Nice house, Meredith. You look like hell."

Tactless as always, the comment had remarkable success. Meredith blinked, startled and despite herself, laughed. "Oh, Matt." She smiled, tears glistening in her eyes. "I do believe I missed that fine spoken grace of yours most."

Wordlessly, Matt pulled her back into another hug, his smile to Elena all the hug she needed. "I'm sorry, Mere. I -- I don't have anything to offer to help you with what you've got to be feeling, and I can't even begin to tell you how sorry I really am that you're dealing with this."

For a giant on the football feel, his heart was pure teddy-bear. "Thank you." Meredith whispered, straightening and rubbing hands over wet cheeks. "That means more than you can know."

That was Elena's cue. With a final smile, she nipped behind Matt's back and darted towards the kitchen, surprisingly with Penny following docilely behind her. "Want a treat?" Fond affection filled her voice.

The dog's tail wagged with greater force.

"Guess so." Pushing the French doors that divided dining room from kitchen open, Elena glanced around at the growing mess, her eyebrow arching in dismay. Pots piled high in the sink, and various plates, glasses and cutlery littered every other available surface, including the stove-top. "People are slobs." She groused, mentally pushing up her sleeves and promising to tackle this next.

Penny gave a low growl, as if in agreement but kept walking straight towards the counter nearest the fridge, her head swinging from counter to Elena and back again.

"Your treats are in there, aren't they?" Elena smiled, finding a small canister just on the top of the counter full of small chunks of beef jerky. "Aren't you spoilt!"

Penny gave a short bark in agreement, sitting neatly in front of Elena and elegantly extending a paw in payment for her treat. A little princess all perky and smart, she made Elena laugh. "You." Elena informed her as she extended the treat in the palm of her hand and watched Penny sacrifice dignity for a scrambled scoop of the treat. "Remind me of Bonnie so very much!"

Penny apparently didn't agree, as she gave the canister one more look and then decided no more treats were forthcoming. Turning about on paw, she vanished back into the dining room and likely to guarding Meredith's mental state some more.

Well, at least that left her a vacant kitchen to attack in peace and quiet. Physically pushing up the sleeves of her sweater, she cast one more accessing gaze over the room and moved purposefully towards the sink.

Fifteen minutes later, the suds were starting to fade, but the kitchen was beginning to take shape again. Pots were dried and hung in the overhanging bin that gave the center-island storage so much character. The glasses all neatly washed, dried and laid away in the cupboard. All that was left was the mound of cutlery. 'How many spoons do people really need for a cup of tea?' Elena marveled silently. 'And how many spoons does Meredith own? Geez!'

The afternoon had faded quickly, early dusk settling in on the world outside. In the west, she could see the sun cast the sky a ruddy red color as it began it's descent below the horizon. 'So much for a short stay.' She sighed. Stefan would be fine, content to just talk with Alaric or ruminate to his own thoughts. She had no worries there.

She did worry about Meredith and Alaric after everyone left. Thankfully, Penny seemed to be capable of keeping them focused on the here and now, rather than what they had lost and the might-have-beens.

'If Klaus really did do this to her, I'll kill him myself.' The vow came with fervent anger, her hands scrubbing harder than intended and water splashing up out of the sink. 'Attacking Meredith in a dream and ripping her baby from her... she awoke to the miscarriage in progress. How horrible.'

Just seeing Klaus in her dreams was bad enough, but to loose her baby immediately after? Part of Meredith had to be blaming herself, as any woman who had lost a child would do, but the knowing part of Meredith aware of Klaus, vampires and the nexus that haunted the peace in Fell's Church placed more blame where she rightfully felt it belonged.

The trick was to ensure she was right. If just once Meredith doubted Klaus was the cause, well, Elena feared for her sanity.

'If it wasn't Klaus, it was something to do with him.' She decided with conviction, yanking the plug from the sink and reaching for the dishtowel. Her gestures and actions were crisp, almost as severe as her thoughts. 'I'll make sure it is.'

The place to start? The vampire Stefan had sensed earlier today. Either it was Damon, or it wasn't. If it was, then what was Damon doing in Fell's Church? If it wasn't, then why was there a vampire in the graveyard? Last she checked, fine dining for the undead required the living.

Folding the towel neatly, she slid it into the space between stove door and around the handle to the door, letting it hang to dry. "That's as clean as I can get it." She decided, turning to eyeball everything with satisfied little sound.

Numerous times since beginning the cleanup she had heard the front door open and close, telling her that Meredith's guests were slowly but steadily leaving. 'That would be our cue too.'

A hand to the back of her neck, rubbing at tight muscles she walked back into the dining room. Meredith and Matt had vacated their chairs in here and Elena straightened up furniture as she passed by.

"There you are!"

Elena turned sharply at Meredith's words. "There who is?" She asked.

"You, I'd wondered where you had disappeared to." Sitting comfortably on the living room furniture, it was just the old gang and dog occupying the room. Matt sat in a wing chair, while Stefan leaned against a wall and Alaric sat beside Meredith on the couch, his arm about her shoulders and her head resting against him.

Penny lay curled contentedly into a ball just to the right of Meredith's feet.

"So, everyone's gone?" Elena sighed, walking towards Stefan and talking the comfort of his embrace.

"Pretty much. We were just waiting for you to reappear." Matt leaned back into the chair. "Your charming husband is allowing me to impose you both."

Elena waved him off. "No imposition, but I hope you have your own car with you."

"No need." Stefan pressed a kiss against her temple. "I'll take an alternate means home. You and Matt take the car. There's something I want to check out, anyway."

The something passed silently between them, Elena nodding slightly to give her approval and acceptance. Not that he wouldn't have gone if she said so, he would have. They didn't meet eye-to-eye on all things, especially if it was something to do with her safety. "Sure."

"Alternate?" Alaric commented mildly from the couch. "Wings or paws?"

"Wings." Stefan mischievously grinned. "I would hate to be impounded as an uncollared animal."

"I'm not putting a collar on Penny." Meredith sniffed. "I don't care what you say. She's a housedog anyway."

At that size? Elena shook her head, and silently was glad that the Salzman's had as large a backyard as they did. At least Penny could get a good run and explore out there.

Penny apparently didn't care either way on the conversation, she kept on dozing as happy as a pig in mud right where she was.

"Poor thing. Cooped up inside all day." Even Matt sympathized with the dog. "No walks?"

"Matt..." There was a clear warning in Meredith's voice.

"Oops, time for me to go." He grinned.

Elena stifled a smile, but nodded agreement at his inquiring look. "I think so." She gave Meredith a shrug. "You two need some peace and quiet to yourselves, anyway."

"Oh, no!" Meredith instantly protested, lifting herself of the couch. "You don't have to go, Alaric and I don't mind."

Her husband nodded his agreement. "It's nice just having friend's around, especially now."

A glance passed through the three others. The message was clear; neither was ready to face each other alone yet, not with the wounds of their loss still so raw.

"Stay the night." Meredith continued. "We'll have a late night, pizza and other junk and just talk old times. Just tonight."

"Well..." Matt vacillated first.

"If it's not an imposition..." Elena seconded, succumbing to the tantalizing idea. Revisiting their innocent years was a welcomed distraction, the fond memories of the past far more comforting than the present.

"It's not." Alaric insisted. "We have two spare rooms, both with beds. Meredith has the world's best robe and nightshirt collection, so you'll have something to wear, the only think I don't have is food for Stefan."

Stefan raised his hand, halting that line of thought immediately. "I have to run out for a few hours, anyway." He countered. "I'll grab something from the forest on my way back."

That was a charming idiom for hunting an animal for its blood if ever the gang had heard one. "Just like Burger King." Matt snickered, apparently well recovered from his denial of the past few years. "Fast food for the undead."

"I get real beef, though." Stefan joked.

"Fine, then." Elena rolled her eyes at the boys. "We'll stay. I'll order pizza for us, my treat."

"Beer?" Matt gave Alaric a pleading look.

"Beer." Alaric nodded.

"Sweet."

"Wine for us, then." Meredith decided, giving her husband a look that spoke volumes. Still standing, she extended her hand to Elena and together they returned to the kitchen. "Fortunately, I have three bottles of wine, compared to Alaric's six beers."

Despite herself, Elena giggled. "Pizza and wine? There's something really wrong about that!" She laughed.

"You don't want some?" Meredith teased, as the two split apart into different directions once in the kitchen. Elena turned left towards the phone and Meredith went right for the corkscrew and wineglasses that the central island unit contained, the glasses overhead, and the corkscrew in a drawer. A synchronous as the team they'd been in highschool, they had the wine bottle opened, wine poured and pizza ordered within mere minutes.

"Don't bother!" Elena laughed, lightly slapping Meredith's hand away as she tried again to shove the cork back into the bottle. "It'll be empty soon enough. And that cork is falling apart after the mess you made of it."

"I made?" Meredith smiled. "You were the one who opened it."

"It was your corkscrew." Elena informed her perkily. "So, it's obviously your fault for poor quality tools."

Meredith slapped her head. "What was I thinking?"

Stefan was gone before they'd returned to the living room, not that Elena minded he'd left without saying goodbye to her. It was his way of promising to be back quickly.

Meredith set the tone for the night, first by insisting they move to the family room, and then by asking Alaric to light the fire. It wasn't really cold enough for a fire, but the homey welcoming comfort of a roaring fire, wine and friends wasn't to be missed.

"I don't know how to ask this," Matt asked, nearly an hour later. "Not without opening some old wounds, but has anyone heard anything from Bonnie?"

Looks were exchanged around the room, all of them sad and resigned. The answer was loud and clear long before Alaric cleared his throat and gently said no.

"I'd wondered..." His voice trailed off, gaze becoming distant. "I thought I saw her a month ago... when we were in Atlanta..."

Elena and Meredith gazed at him with eager eyes. "What do you mean? Was it Bonnie?" Elena breathed.

All eyes, including Penny's, were on Matt and he was uncomfortable with their avid attention. "Well--," he shrugged helplessly. "The team was there for a game, and a couple of us decided to do some sight-seeing."

"Bars." Alaric inserted dryly.

Matt flashed him a grin. "Are there any other kind of sights when in a strange and foreign college-town?" His amusement sobered, though, as his mind flashed back.

----

The sun had set some time before the four teammates had wandered down towards the campus' most popular pubs. The goal was little more than one-night stands and a lot of flirting fun. 'I shouldn't be doing this.' Matt muttered absently, straightening the hem on his sweater. The damn thing was too tight, even if it did show off his upper chest muscles wonderfully.

'Relax, Honeycutt!' Jake had urged, slapping a meaty hand on Matt's back. 'Your girlfriend ain't here, and it's not like she'll know you were checking out the local market.'

Sourly, Matt glared at Jake. He was a big man, just like the rest of the football team. Dark brown hair, a Neanderthal forehead and rugged-rough good looks kept him popular with the ladies, especially as a defenseman for the team. So popular, that in the past three years Matt couldn't recall Jake ever being with one girl twice. 'Have you ever, just in passing, been faithful to any girlfriend?' Matt asked rhetorically.

Jake's face scrunched up, whether from indigestion or mental pain Matt didn't know.

'Faithful is a state of mind.' Jake decided loftily, earning an agreeable grunt from Hent. 'I'm faithful to them when I'm with them, and afterwards it's all over. Besides, Honeycutt, weren't you the one bitching that Christina wanted too much from you? That you wanted out?'

Matt froze. Well sure, he and Chris were going through a rough patch but that didn't mean he should rush out and cheat on her did it?

Arguments were bound to crop up in relationships, it was a known fact.

Then again, Chris had been breaking off a lot of their dates, pushing him away to party with her girlfriends. Maybe it was over and his brain just hadn't caught up with what his body already knew?

'I'm being an idiot.' He decided, straightening his shoulders. 'Why should Chris go out and party it up if I can't?'

'That's my man!' Hooted Jake. 'Check that one out right there.'

Tall, Asian and utterly sensual, 'that one' was a hormonal experience just to look at. 'Nice.' Hent purred the word. 'Very nice. I wonder if she has a twin.'

Nothing like old fashioned testosterone and hormones to liven up a bar scene.

Blond haired and blue eyed, his good looks and physical build did all the work for him with the girls. Speech and intelligence were secondary assets as far as women looking for a good time were concerned. Three-quarter's of an hour after arriving, he was in a back bench area with Hannah and Susan on either side.

Hent had vanished into the night with his pick, and Jake was still working the field, lavishing his abundant attention on numerous others.

----

"That's when I saw her." Matt soberly lifted his beer bottle and drained it outright, the dark glass obscuring the faces of his friends for a moment.

Settling the empty bottle between both hands, his shoulder's hunched over and gaze became fixated on the rounded opening. Like a black hole, it seemed to suck his mind into the oblivion of tinted glass, removing the variables around him.

"Matt?" Elena called. "What about Bonnie?"

Ah yes. Bonnie. The phantasm that had haunted his days and nights since. What if she was nothing more than his subconscious jerking him away from being unfaithful to his now-ex girlfriend?

What if that flash of red hair hadn't been real? More importantly, what if it had.

----

His ladies had wanted a drink, so ever the gallant gentleman he'd escaped to provide said beverages. Christina was little more than a distant memory in the back of his mind after a few beers and even the slight taste of guilt that his actions rose wasn't enough to stray him from the course of his intended nocturnal plans.

"You shouldn't do that." A familiar voice murmured.

Matt froze, head swinging around searching for the source. "Who? Where?"

Men around the bar gazing at the game on the TV, women chatting it up with each other, no one stood out as alone or close enough to talk to him so softly.

"Are those two floozies worth sacrificing your love for Christina?"

He knew that voice, he knew that fragrance, but he couldn't remember where or why. "Who are you?"

"Your past. Just as they are not your future. Don't fuck it up, Matt. Not again."

His mind shuddered as memories tried to burst through, long pent up images and recollections of events he was happier denying. Elena on his arm, Elena dead, Elena undead and feeding from him... Meredith's intent gaze, Meredith hurt and limp under a tree in a dark clearing... Tyler Smallwood looming like a sweaty giant over the girls... Stefan. Damon. Bonnie.

Red burst into his mind like a broken artery, and the names and scenes raced back in synchronous order. It was painful, like a hot lance had been plunged deep into his skull. Without being aware of it, he reached up to cradle his head barely suppressing the urge to keen painfully.

A cool breeze seemed to sweep into the bar, people around him becoming incredibly still as the ice on it touched them. It swirled around him, visibly tangible but incredibly distant. "Remember, and do what's right."

"Bonnie!" The cry was a scream, his head snapping up and eyes searching for a sign of her. The girlfriend he'd never had, the one he'd let slide away because he was too hesitant to move forward. The bright red hair and warm brown eyes in an elfin face. The tiny body and sweetest heart that anyone had ever known.

Bonnie McCullough.

The pain was gone, replaced by a furious need to find her. Shoving past people and tables, he heard more than one man shout at him or a woman yelp at the sudden abrasive actions. The women at his table were long forgotten, nothing mattered but finding that ghostly voice that had released memories he'd tried so hard to deny.

"Bonnie!" He bellowed again, coming to a standstill outside of the bar, his legs spread and arms akimbo while his chest heaved for air.

Scouring across the darkness of the street with lit pockets from the hanging light, he looked for any sigh of movement, anything. There was nothing. 'I know that was Bonnie. I know it!'

His shoulder's slumped in admitted defeat, turning around with a lowered head he lifted a hand to push the door to the bar open.

A flash of red caught the corner of his eye, and he turned his head slightly, lips parting.

It was a fleeting moment, just a quick half second but long enough. The same tiny body and brilliant hair combined with a profile he would know even unconscious. Darting across a street and into an alley as lithely as a gazelle in flight. Just for a second, her head turned his way, a small soft smile on her lips.

Matt reacted instantly racing off towards that alley. Jumping over a small fence that divided the building yard from the sidewalk, he stumbled across the road without looking to see if a car was coming. Fortunately, it was well past midnight and traffic was minimal.

He ran into a garbage can, the metal lid bouncing to the ground and against the brick wall neighboring the alley with a clatter. "Bonnie!" He shouted, eyes wide and hungry for another glimpse.

Light was scarce, minimal in the alley. For a girl as nervous and easily frightened as Bonnie, it made no sense that she'd run in here.

Skirting around a dumpster, and jumping over a homeless man or two, Matt stumbled to a dead end. 'Where is she?'

Nothing. The men lying in sleeping bags or with newspapers on top of them were filthy derelicts curled into fetal position or toppled over where they wearily fell. Not a splash of red hair amongst them, or the slight delicate build of a tiny elf.

There was no way out, unless Bonnie had learned to fly. 'I wasn't dreaming. I wasn't.' He stumbled back to the mouth of the alley, he scoured walls for a door, a niche, anything she could have hidden away in. Nothing. Nada. Just a few beggars, some homeless children and one tabby-cat.

Yet, there was no sign of her. "I looked." Matt finished his narrative, the empty beer bottle rolling between his two hands. "I checked the dumpster, I scoured the alley and I checked every door that backed onto it. Nothing. It was like a figment in my head, but I swear to God that it was Bonnie.

"Perhaps it was Bonnie." Stefan's voice startled them all. His hair was plastered to his head, wet, as was his coat and clothes. Face pale and set in a grim expression, they knew just looking at him that trouble was indeed in Fell's Church.

"What happened?" Elena gasped, jumping up and racing over to him. Her fingers worked on his jacket, tenderly taking it off him. A gasp stole her lips as she found the deep rents in the leather, long finger-like tears shredding through the fabric and deep into the flesh beneath.

Wordlessly, Meredith disappeared for the upstairs and a cluster of soft towels.

"I ran into a little trouble." Her lover sighed. "And I found a lot more."


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter Three**

Damon Salvatore was big trouble. There was nothing little about his brand of trouble, and yet, knowing he had returned was like hearing the trumpet sounding the assembly of the old guard.

Damon's face was the usual impassive nonchalance that they were all familiar with. Arrogant was probably the first word to strike a person's mind when seeing him for the first or second time. It oozed in the set of his shoulders and look in his eyes, just as strong as sensuality did.

Elena knew better. Damon Salvatore might look the part of the big bad vampire, but it was to protect his heart from getting hurt. Maybe it was Katherine that caused the first pain and earned this resolve, but she doubted so. From what she knew, Elena suspected the premature death of his mother was the fertile ground that brought forth this hard cold man.

"Damon." Her head inclined regally in greeting as their small group entered the old barn on Mrs. Flower's property. The old woman never seemed to notice or mind their comings and goings, which was a good thing, given the circumstances that brought them here.

"Elena." Just as regal, he gave her a glance, before sliding on to watch each of them find a seat. Sardonic amusement seemed to hang around his mouth as he stared at Meredith and Alaric sitting close together with clasped hands.

For a moment, Elena feared he'd make a comment on the lost baby, but it passed as his eyes turned to study Matt before coming to rest on his brother.

"You look better." The comment held two messages to it. The first was obvious, after the scuffle the night before, Stefan had looked like a drowned rat. Were it not for Damon's sudden appearance and aid, Elena had no doubt that Stefan would have been considerably less than 'better'.

Of course, the other implied message wasn't so nice. It was Damon's snarky way of declaring awareness for Stefan's changed diet.

"You haven't changed." For all that Stefan might have a noble streak, he was still a brother. Sibling rivalry wasn't a new invention by any means.

"Touché, little brother." Damon applauded. Perched almost precariously on a rail, he seemed as at home here as in his car. Leather jacket shone with a black sheen and suited the perfect black pants and the crimson sweater beneath. "So. Your little gang seems shy a few people. Running late?"

Elena sucked a breath in, and shot Matt a desperate look. Everyone here knew exactly who he was referring to, especially Matt.

Oddly enough, Matt's face reflected cynical amusement. "Bonnie's gone, Damon." There was no mistaken the dark humor in his voice, the kind of hidden jibe against Damon's alleged superiority... and a rather malign sense of self-defeat.

Maybe it was her imagination, but a shadow rippled across the vampire's face. "Gone?" He asked sharply, his head turning to give his brother a piercing look. The sardonic laziness, the upper-hand displayed in his body language dissolved away instantly. Bonnie was obviously the necessary key to all of this, and her absence unnerved Damon's pre-arranged plans.

Stefan shrugged. "Day after you. She became very sick, collapsed and disappeared from the hospital less than twenty-four hours after..." What happened after was left unsaid. After Klaus was destroyed, after Elena restored, after Damon had said adieu, after so many things had happened. "We can only assume she's dead after so long and no luck with our searches."

"She was sick, immediately after Klaus' was defeated?" Damon asked. "How so?"

"Sensory deprivation chills, raging fever, nausea, bloodloss from accidentally slicing herself on glass, fatigue, arrhythmia... sick." Meredith's voice was tart but still cool and controlled. "You might have been familiar with the concept, albeit several hundred years ago. Now, you're just dead."

"This isn't going well." Muttered Elena softly. Hostility towards Damon wouldn't help the situation. They had a problem and only together could they do anything about it.

Damon's lips set into a thin line, dark eyes flashing to her face for just a scant moment. "No, it isn't." He growled in agreement. "I'm not playing gallant knight for you all. I have no wish to see Klaus returned as my brother and I are pre-emanate on his most wanted destroyed list. I'll scratch your back if you scratch mine, and that is the way this will work."

"Fair enough." Meredith agreed calmly, like a professional negotiator who had no personal investment in the outcome. "What do you know?"

It was like watching a poker game between two card sharks. Both savvy, both witty and both not giving an inch to the other player as they strived to prove one were better than the other. Coolly Meredith dealt her hand and waited for the return.

"I know the vampires encountered last night are Klaus' childer." Damon folded his arms across his chest, imperiously gazing down at his verbal sparring partner. "They are here to avenge and free their sire. Much like Katherine, they've been groomed and infected with some form of hysteria or insanity towards doing so." He shrugged, tossing Stefan a pointed look. "They've also enjoyed a very stable diet over the past centuries, but recently have been fed something better to cause such a maturation of powers in all. I suspect some Ancient's are involved, though I've encountered none and have no evidence to support my theory."

Meredith nodded, satisfied with his contribution. "Okay. So, we have a pack of vampires at full strength bent on revenge and possible some of Klaus' kindred waiting in the wings. How do we stop them?" The question was open to the public, she truly wasn't expecting an answer, just suggestions.

Damon shrugged, indifferently. "We don't stop them. Or rather, we wouldn't have to, in other circumstances. Your little friend would have."

Matt made the connection first, but of course, Matt was hyper aware where Bonnie was concerned. "Bonnie?" he lunged forward, not threateningly but with a rather avid interest. "You mean Bonnie. What's she got to do with this? She couldn't kill a fly, much less a vampire or a whole pack of them. News update: Buffy the Vampire Slayer was just a TV show."

"She stopped Klaus." Damon answered as if that would explain everything.

"Elena did that." Stefan argued.

Elena shook her head. "No. I didn't." She corrected softly. "Not really, did I?" Damon's hard gaze settled on her once again, this time with grave appraisal. "Bonnie summoned me and the host. She stopped Klaus. We acted using her power." It had taken a few years to look back on that night with any sort of rationality, but as time passed it was easier to recall her existence as a spirit summoned to this plane by a greater power.

"Precisely." Damon nodded in satisfaction, rather like a teacher well pleased with his student.

Matt's mouth trembled, his eyes dancing with laughter. "Oh, that's good. Well then." He stood up, brushing his thighs up to dust off hay and imaginary dirt. "Jerk out the Ouiji board. We'll just give Bonnie a call in the great supernatural beyond and we can clean this up before dinner. Thanks so much! Christ, people, she's dead! Bonnie's dead! She can't help us!"

Elena winced, shuddering away at the thought and vaguely alarmed that Matt who could have sworn he'd seen Bonnie would give up on her so easily. "We don't know that for sure!" She protested half-heartedly.

Damon cut into her voice with a growl. "Use your brain, idiot. Your friend is not dead!" He snarled, first at Matt and then at them all. "She can't be, or things would be much much worse. That girl is the guardian to Klaus' prison. It's her power that sealed him in and it's her being that has to keep him in. If she were dead, he would be free. Fighting the childer hand to hand is not her task; it has nothing to do with what she is meant for. She has to prove her cage is stronger than whatever it is they're trying to do."

"And the childer?"

Damon shrugged, casually indifferent and as if faced with a redundantly obvious question. "We kill them. They aren't originals, they're just average run of the mill vampires. They can be destroyed. If the Originals involved step in, then we have bigger problems than the childer altogether." It went unsaid, that if the Originals were involved, being destroyed would be a mercy. Despite his cavalier attitude and the alleged superiority he claimed, Damon was of the same blood as Stefan, and he was happy to be destroyed before allowing Klaus claim on the Earth again.

"Just like that, hmm" Matt retorted irritably. "Find Bonnie wherever she is, sic her on the childer, and then kill them. Gee, sounds simple enough. Too simple." His face twisted sourly, eyes rolling up as if to say he knew it was never going to work out so straightforward. "Oh, wait, here's the twist: if Bonnie's not dead, why can't anyone find her?"

"Because she doesn't want to be found." Meredith sighed. "And I'm guessing finding her just became our first priority, didn't it?"

"Si." Damon nodded, the arrogance sliding from his face and leaving behind a weary traveler. "Although, this illness of hers… this is not auspicious."

"She felt different." Stefan offered softly, quietly into the lull that descended over the barn. "That last day I saw her… when we took her to the hospital." His eyes flicked first to Elena, then Meredith as if entreating them to remember that day and contribute.

Damon and Matt both stared at Stefan transfixed, neither of them looking at either of the girl's as they spoke up in turn.

"She was so out of it, really disjointed and weird." Elena breathed, a fist rising to her mouth as the memories rushed painfully in.

"Her heartbeat was erratic, and sluggish. Typical symptoms for bloodloss or aggravated heart disease." Meredith splayed her hands out flat on her thighs, not even aware of when Alaric took her left hand in his right to reassuringly squeeze. "The bleeding had almost stopped when we got there, and then started again. I don't even want to know how much blood she lost. The hospital gave her two units while we were there…and after…" She shrugged helplessly. "There's no way Klaus could be imprisoned if Bonnie were…?"

"None." Damon bit the word off savagely. "Different how, Stefan?" The gibing tone of voice they'd always known was absent. His brother's name was spoken without the usual mockery. "In what way did she feel different? Scent? Power? As potential prey?"

Stefan grimaced at the last. "No, never… I never…" He shook his head, refocusing. "I don't know. I really don't. I felt her powers changing, of that I'm certain. But, scent? There was so much blood I couldn't smell anything else. So much blood and power." He sighed.

"Did you hunger for it?"

Stefan blinked. His jaw opened and closed as a sort of wondered amazement crept across his features. "No. I didn't."

"At all?" The eerie earnestness in Damon's eyes was alarming, persistent and frightening in its dedication.

"No. Not at all. I remember giving her some of my power to rouse her from a torpor, and then… after she mindspoke me, I had to shield my thoughts and hers, she was too disoriented to do anything else."

Eyebrows arched all around the room. "You never told me that…" Elena gasped.

Stefan shrugged. "At the time, beloved, you couldn't handle the information, and afterwards, it didn't seem to matter." The wry smile softened the words considerably, as did the tender touch of his hand on her cheek.

"What does that mean?" Matt interrupted their moment. "Does it mean anything? Stefan? Damon?"

Damon shrugged, a more dramatic echo of Stefan's own confusion. "I don't know. I wasn't there." The older Salvatore answered. "And my little brother's dietary habits left him poorly suited to sense anything, now didn't it." The sour twist of his lips spoke even more disparagingly against Stefan's humanitarian urges.

"What does it matter." Alaric spoke his first contribution. "What happened then doesn't answer where Bonnie is now."

Damon's dark eyebrow arched, an enigmatic smile touching his mouth. "Very true." He praised softly, goadingly. "So, Herr Docteur, where do we start in your opinion?"

"We have two choices." Alaric took the opportunity unwittingly offered and gave his opinion unstintingly. "Or rather, two ways to approach the question. Either, a) Bonnie was taken from the hospital by force, or b) she left of her own volition. If a) then we need to figure out who would have seized her and where they would have taken her. If it was b) then we can only assume she went to ground for a reason and if just have to figure out where she'd go hide."

"Scotland." Elena shot out. "She'd go to Scotland. She loved visiting there, and kept telling us that a person could go to Scotland, find a small town and become anonymous and invisible in their small societies."

Meredith nodded, casting a radiantly pleased smile on her husband. "I agree."

"And if she was seized?" Alaric persisted.

"She wasn't." Damon's eyes were distant. "The only individuals with any potential motives are Klaus' childer. They're here trying to find a key to release Klaus. If they had Bonnie, they'd have that key."

"Scotland, then." Matt breathed, looking up at the ceiling of the barn. "Anyone know a good travel agent?"

"We can't all go." Meredith countered. "If attacks are going to start in town, some of us need to be here to keep an eye on the situation."

Damon's derisive snort was ignored.

"Agreed." Stefan folded his arms across his chest. "I propose Matt and Damon go to Scotland. The rest of us, we do what we can here."

"I hate and loathe Great Britain, little brother." Damon shot in loftily. "Why don't you and Boy-Wonder go to the great wet rusty isle and I'll stay here."

Stefan's smile was as unpleasant as it could get. "Why, big brother, to do that would infer that I trusted you not to play mind games on my wife. And I don't."

- - - - -

"Passports, please?" The customs agent was a graying woman, the crows feet about her eyes and the lines around her mouth gave all the testimony as to what she thought about her job. It didn't require any degree of genius to measure the sheer boredom and blasé interest in her work from her voice alone.

Of course, Damon noticed a million other details that Matt, his delightful traveling companion on this expedition, missed. Such as the yellowed nails, and the brown tinge to her gumline. "Cancer." He advised sotto voice to Matt. "Of the lungs, most likely. I give her two years at best."

Matt rolled his eyes, pocketing his passport into his jacket. "Charming, Damon. Do you go around accessing everyone's lifespan's with such tender concern for our wellbeing?"

Midnight black eyes stared fathomlessly into the distance. "Not everyone's, no." The vampire replied, almost as if not paying attention. "There are some whose lives I can not read."

"Really?"

"Yes." Damon glanced over at Matt, the direct nature of his gaze disconcerting to anyone. However, Matt had sworn never to let Damon's predatory nature put him on edge. Damon had sworn a blood oath to his brother not to harm a hair on Matt's head, or touch a drop of Matt's blood, and if anything, he had to depend on the strength of the Salvatore's love for oaths.

He would not, no matter how hard the urge was to fight down, ask about what the elder Salvatore brother read into Matt's own lifespan. Knowing Damon, the answer would be 'It depends.' Sighing, Matt hefted his carry-on bag, ruefully chiding himself for the millionth time on not taking Meredith's kind offer and borrowing hers. "There's got to be an easier way to do this." He muttered.

Damon didn't say a word, he just casually strode on past customs and boldly towards security. With the slick grace of a panther on the prowl in his movements, he was disdainfully arrogant, strolling past the admiring glances of the women, and men, around him.

'A prince amongst us mere mortals.' Matt's lips twitched with dark humor. 'Of course he would notice the cattle around him. That would be like a farmer developing feelings of love and tenderness for old Bessie.' So amused with the thoughts, but still keeping general tab on Damon, Matt trudged behind.

The ten-hour flight to Glasgow with Damon as a seatmate was likely to be incredibly trying. Matt had long established that simple tricks like anti-nausea medication that in theory caused drowsiness didn't work on him, so instead he'd brought along his Economics textbook from first year. Nothing like this textbook had been as effective at putting him out.

With his football physique and constant pressure to stay fit for the next season, Matt abstained from the confectionery counter that preceded their gate area. Instead, he grabbed a bottle of water and a Sports Illustrated and then wandered ahead to join Damon.

The vampire was sprawled in one of the black vinyl covered chairs, ankles crossed boldly in the seat of a matching chair opposite him. With his dark shades down, arms folded and face completely relaxed but impassive, a passerby would think the young man was insolently sleeping without consideration for other passengers.

Matt, however, played poker with some of the best and knew a pose when he saw it. "I don't see why you and Stefan couldn't have both stayed in Fell's Church. Elena and I could have made this trip." He commented sourly.

"My little brother doesn't trust you with his wife, either." Damon retorted.

Matt just snorted. "If all these childer are hunting in the Fell's Church area with the goal of raising Klaus, wouldn't Stefan rather you and he were here to deal with it, and Elena safely elsewhere?"

"Have you ever played chess with Stefan?" The sunglasses were lowered, eyebrow raised inquisitively. Matt shook his head. "Do, sometime. It's enlightening as to how Stefan foolishly plots his battles."

"What?" Matt frowned, confused by the reference.

"To protect the Queen, he will sacrifice not the pawns, but the Bishop, the King, everything that leaves the Queen utterly vulnerable." Damon hadn't opened his eyes yet, he still looked recumbent, but his tone of voice wasn't so casual. There was actual concern lying below the surface bite.

Matt briefly closed his eyes, easily understanding everything Damon had implied, and realized that somehow as unpleasant as this trip would be, it would be the safest forty-eight hours of his life. "And I'd choose now to regain nicely suppressed memories. More the fool am I." He muttered under his breath.

"Indeed." Damon drawled.

And that was the perfect example of why traveling with a snarky vampire was not mentally healthy. Matt groaned silently inside his head. He wasn't sure he could do it. "I'm going to get food." He decided, taking refuge in avoiding the vampire until the flight was boarding.

Damon snorted. "Were it that I could."

"If you want a burger, I'll bring one back. Anything other, you're so on your own."

Damon's responding smirk wasn't comforting, and Matt scurried off.

The waiting room was buzzing with the noise of travelers, equipment operating the terminal, and the steady hum of the ventilation. All in all, sleeping in this ruckus seemed impossible for Damon. In many ways, he missed the centuries preceding this. They were, universally, much quieter times.

Yet, time stood still for no man, even for a vampire and Damon had learned to adapt. He had seventy minutes until the flight should board, and by damn he was not enduring that time watching the cattle or talking to the linebacker he was being forced to travel with. Sleeping through the wait was oh so much more pleasant a concept. With that in mind, he committed his consciousness to ignore the world around him, and let his attention draw deep within.

A rarity for him was to dream. Since his body was technically un-dead, it didn't channel the electrical impulses in the brain in the same fashion as the living, and REM sleep just didn't happen. If a medic were to examine him while asleep, the word "dead" would be the first thing to come to the mind. Damon didn't care, either way. Dead, undead, asleep, awake, the sheer peace of not being fully aware of the cattle around him made the 'unconscious' state endearing.

But dreams? Those he sometimes yearned for, but feared all the same. Most occasions when a vision hit him while in his restful state were less 'dream' than precognizant warnings of trouble. He was a creature of the night, both a hunter and the hunted at the same time. Precognitive instincts were important for both aspects.

"Even if they're not all about you?" A warm amused voice chided his mental ramblings. "You care far more than you ever let on, don't you, Damon. Especially about what kind of crap your little brother will end up rolling in while you're on a goose-chase."

His eyes popped open, and despite his best effort, his jaw dropped open. This wasn't the airport, and that wasn't Matt sitting across from him. "Bonnie. What a delightful surprise. Where are we?"

She shrugged, her long straight hair cascading like a silken sheet from her shoulders down her back. "It's your head. You tell me." She looked around at the dark paneled wood, and the marble floor, her hand stroking the velvet settee she was perched on with appreciation for the softness. "I'm not here, if that's what you're asking. And no, I'm not telling. If I wanted to be found, I'd just show up. I don't."

"Even if your friend's could die?"

Brown eyes sparkled. "They're fine. Klaus' childer can try all they want, but even if they freed him, it wouldn't change a thing. In fact, I can guarantee that the last thing Klaus wants is freedom right now." Her smile widened, teeth pearly white. "Trust me."

"They are hunting them."

"Tell them not to go out at night. Take the welcome mat off the front step, and especially tell Meredith and Alaric to keep their dog close to them. Dogs are first warning systems when it comes to the supernatural. Klaus had forty-three children. I've destroyed about twenty two of them. Give or take a few surviving… but the odds aren't favorable. I think what you really need to be doing is finding out where Tyler is hiding. He's your big problem right now. Vengeful little alliance making Tyler Smallwood. Get some silver bullets. They'll come in handy, especially tonight during the full moon – just behind Mrs. Flowers place. Don't get on the plane, Damon. They need you tonight."

"They want you."

There was sorrow in her expression then, "No. They don't. And it's better this way for all."

"Bonnie…"

A sudden kick to his leg made him jump, and this time when his eyes truly opened it was Matt's less than pretty mug frowning down at him. "She was in my head." He spit out before he could saddle up his aloof.

"They're calling us to board." Matt blinked. "Who was in your head?"

"Bonnie. Grab your stuff. We're not going. She's not in Scotland. And if she were, she wouldn't be by the time we got there." He slung his carry-on bag over his shoulder, and started moving towards the exit, long strides eating the distance. He could hear Matt scrambling to grab his stuff, struggling to catch up.

"What's going on…?" Matt gasped, his contempt for Damon momentarily gone.

"Bonnie. Had a little chat with her in my head. She doesn't want to be found, and will go out of her way to make sure she won't be found. We have a bigger problem, she said. A fuzzy rabid mutt problem by name of Tyler."

"Oh shit."

Damon glanced at his watch. It was an hour to sunset. "If we hustle, we can get back just in time for the wolf to start hunting. Was your little coven of friends meeting at Mrs. Flowers tonight?"

"Yes." Matt groaned. "They are… sitting ducks there. Crap." His muscled body started to move faster, outpacing the vampire in his haste to get to the exit. "Anything else?"

Damon smiled wolfishly. "Your little friend isn't so smart." He stopped at the curb and looked for a cab, before continuing. "She knew too much about what's going on in Fell's Church. The reason she can hide so well from us? It's because she's already here."

10


End file.
